Saturday is for fun!

Well, usually Saturday is for laundry and vacuuming that I've neglected during the week, but this Saturday was for fun!  After reading Dharmawrites' latest blog post about her finds at the Planned Parenthood used book sale, I was inspired to tell everyone about my haul too. 

Catherine and I went this morning (even got there before the doors opened - which means you're standing outside in the cold with an assortment of other weirdos who do things like 

get to used book sales before the doors open!) We hit the table labeled, I believe, "household arts" first (yeah, I'm not ashamed to admit it - even though it sounds very 50's - "where will the ladies go?  to the household arts table, of course!") where we did our best to corner the market on old craft books. I picked up some gems: McCalls Needlework Treasury from 1963 and The Good Housekeeping Needlecraft Encyclopedia from 1947 - 

both chock full of great instructions for like everything I'll never do!  Oh yeah, at this point in the game we're both grabbing everything we even halfway think we might want because you gotta know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em - and the foldn' 'em part comes later when you take you haul to a corner, like a squirrel hording its acorn, and sort through it all to make your final decisions (or maybe that's the part where i'm supposed to say "there'll be time enough for countin' when the dealin's done" I don't know I've grown weary of this Kenny Rogers analogy now.)  Anyway, I migrated over to the "collectible cookbooks" table next and scored more great stuff - The American Woman's Cookbook from 1942

 which has a whole section on, basically, how to be a good housewife.  In the Menu Making chapter there's a bit that reads "The appearance of food is important to the modern man.  Beautiful color and dainty, attractive arrangement play a large part in a successful meal." - I love that!   Oh, there's even a section on vegetarian entrees, which surprised me - although it's pretty much just billed as an economical meal, and lots of the recipes still call for stuff like bacon fat and gelatin!  Oh, then I got some little gems in the stack of booklet type cookbooks - Favorite Recipes from the United Nations (published by the UN in '56), The Ground Meat Cookbook (seriously?  204 intriguing ground meat recipes!), and (this one's for you to be jealous of Dharmawrites!) Cooking Way Down South in Dixie from '49.  

Man - I could have looked at old cookbooks all afternoon!  I got more than that - but those are some highlights!  I walked out with a bag for something like $21 and I'm half considering going back tomorrow when it's something like $5 for all you can stuff in a bag.  

I had to rush out (and by that I mean that I only had 2 hours to spend there, which felt like nothing) because I was going to a Weaving Guild workshop on the rigid heddle loom!  I totally thought I'd be running in there late and there'd be like 30 weavers giving me the stare down, but Cay (the woman I bought my loom from, who also happened to be doing the workshop) pulled up just as I did, and as it turned out, I was the only one who showed up!  She said there were only a couple who signed up and they were a little iffy.  So basically it was like a private lesson!  Even though I'd already warped my loom once, it was great to do it with someone who actually knew what she was doing!  I brought my finished piece to show her so she could see my edge issues and after I got the thing all warped and started weaving she helped me with that. 

 So basically I just sat there weaving for hours and got to ask her a million questions!  I kind of felt bad that I took up her whole afternoon just for me - but it was certainly a big help!  This time I warped it for a 5ft scarf and used the same shiny yellow/gold rayon for the warp, and some JoJoland sock yarn in a colorway that moves from blue-green to green, for the weft.  It's gonna be beautiful!

  Ok, man, this is a long post - my appologies!  It was an exciting day!